-Identify and endorse academic and research programs that align to our BPM CBOK®

-Work with academic research organizations to promote an active research agenda in BPM

According to the ABPMP International's Guide to The Business Process Management Common Body Of Knowledge®, "Business Process Management (BPM) is a disciplined approach to identify, design, execute, document, measure, monitor, and control both automated and non-automated business processes to achieve consistent, targeted results aligned with an organization’s strategic goals. BPM involves the deliberate, collaborative and increasingly technology-aided definition, improvement, innovation, and management of end-to-end business processes that drive business results, create value, and enable an organization to meet its business objectives with more agility. BPM enables an enterprise to align its business processes to its business strategy, leading to effective overall company performance through improvements of specific work activities either within a specific department, across the enterprise, or between organizations."

The ABPMP International believes that becoming a Business Process Management Professional is a journey, and not a destination. The core knowledge areas are only the foundation to the practice of the profession.

"While there seem to be many successful models for implementing BPM in organizations, one thing they all have in common is the many new roles with new sets of skills and responsibilities all centered on BPM."

Some of the more common roles are:

-Business Process Analyst

-Business Process Engineer

-Business Process Architect

-Business Process Manager

-Business Process Consultant

-Business Process Manager

-Business Process Owner

-Business Analyst

-Business Systems Analyst

-Manager or Director of Business Performance Improvement

-Manager or Director of Business Process Innovation

-Process Owner

-Process Officer

"These titles and their variants cover the majority of the new roles and responsibilities in process managed organizations. Regardless of the roles or organizational structure, they generally are responsible for the same sets of activities: Process Modeling, Process Analysis, Process Design, Process Change and Transformation, Process Implementation, Process Monitoring and Control, and Process Performance Improvement.

Some of these roles may be staffed in IT organizations and some in business disciplines. Many organizations are staffing cross-discipline groups combining both IT and business knowledge or with people who have served in both IT and business units and bring a depth of knowledge and range of skills that transcend traditional boundaries. Many have found that combining people who have general consulting type knowledge and skills with those who have a depth of business specific knowledge is a successful strategy for BPM efforts."

"As businesses continue to address globalization and increasing competition, companies are becoming more collaborative and process-centric.

This view requires the necessary and needed skills to integrate business processes over different business functions and often-disparate information technologies to bring value to the customer. There is a growing need for universities to develop a curriculum that allows for an undergraduate major in BPM and a Masters of Science in BPM.

In addition, a modular format can be adapted to a specialized certificate program in BPM. For example, the suggested coursework could consist of five core BPM courses that rangefrom a general introduction of BPM and continues throughout the process lifecycle of modeling, analysis, design, and implementation. In addition, there could be three elective courses, which allow for a more in-depth exploration of BPM followed by a capstone course on Business Process Strategy. Below is an example of how a course could be structured."

There are some universities, which have developed programs in BPM; however, there are no degree programs as of this writing. A sample undergraduate curriculum is suggested below.

PROPOSAL OF AN UNDERGRADUATE CURRICULUM

Type

Course Title

Sample Content

core

Introduction to BPM

To overview the BOK material,
BPM and related topics.
BPM Lifecycle.
Why process management
What is involved in BPM
Business Architectures.
Explore BPM career paths.

While the above curriculum is just a suggestion, it is the vision of the ABPMP International to enable the development of BPM model curricula at universities leveraging the BPM CBOK® to serve as a roadmap for the core knowledge areas, inspiring practitioners to pursue and develop broader knowledge and experiences along their journey.